Why I do something everyday that scares me | Emma Van Der Merwe | TEDxUniversityofEdinburgh

it was the adventure of a lifetime my husband and I were trekking to Mount Everest base camp in the spectacular Himalaya but I'd never climbed at that altitude before and my body was battling to acclimatize to the thin air I was feeling nauseous and dizzy my head was pounding and breathing was really difficult so after scaling a particularly steep section I took off my backpack I turned to my husband and said I don't feel so good the next thing I remember is feeling as if I was in a vivid dream a dream in which I was rolling downhill fast my head and face repeatedly hitting rocks and stones tuft of grass my head and neck were being flung about like a rag doll and I was literally eating dirt on every turn and then suddenly I realized that this was not a dream that I must have blacked out and fallen after taking off my backpack and this was then of course followed by sheer panic when I remembered where I was realizing that I better stop myself from rolling any further or I would die so clutching at stones and sticks I managed to come to a painful halt I just rolled almost 200 meters down a mountain in the Himalaya what followed were some of the scariest and longest hours of my life as I waited for the rescue helicopter I feared that I would die I mean I was I wasn't scared to die but I wasn't ready then I feared that I would never walk again eventually the helicopter arrived and two hours later I was checked into a hospital and Kathmandu we did some x-rays some CT scans which showed that I'd broken my hand and severely bruised my neck and back so now I had a decision to make would I pack it up call it a day and go back home or would I return to the mountains when I was released from hospital this wasn't the first time life had thrown a curveball at me at the age of 17 I was diagnosed with a potentially deadly illness it's an illness that inhabits our most powerful organ ultimately controlling our thoughts our emotions our sense of self it's called major depressive disorder or depression depression potentially deadly illness whatever I hear some of you say well research tells us that depression is one of the biggest risk factors if not the biggest risk factors for suicide globally 800,000 people die by suicide every year that is one death every 40 seconds I'm about three minutes into my talk and what this means is that since I started speaking for people somewhere in the world of die by suicide scary isn't it I'm often asked what a depressive episode feels like you see the strange thing is that depression leaves you numb almost unable to feel the only feeling you're left with is fear this perpetual anxiety that something is going to go horribly wrong any second even if rational reasoning or your husband tells you it won't but you see as much as living in fear can become a habit so can challenging and overcoming that fear also become a habit and so one day I asked myself what if instead of allowing fear to control my life I did something every day that scared so I formulated a little plan of action and basically what I decided was that instead of focusing on the fear I would focus on what lay beyond the fear on what I could possibly pursue beyond this fear you see in life our fears prescribe certain pursuits to us pursuits that feel safe within the confines or the context of the sphere I will explain later but I decided for myself on certain pursuits not prescribed by fear and those three pursuits I would like to share with you today frame there's three decisions that are made over the course of my life decision number one pursue experiences not things journalism is not the world's best paying job yet this was the road I chose to go down after many years of studying and traveling meanwhile some of my friends working better paying jobs were spending money on designer clothes nice cars well-deserved holidays I felt a niggling of envy which gradually green top which gradually developed into a fear a fear that told me I would never be able to afford anything a fear that I couldn't keep up you see the one who dies with the most toys wins right my opportunity to challenge and ultimately overcome this fear came when I was assigned to cover news stories across Africa as a journalist in Africa the continents I call home so I remember traveling to South Sudan where I met and interviewed a former child soldier he had miraculously escaped them he was now able to attained primary school for the first time and there he was sitting in the grade one class in the front row starched white shirt so proud to be able to learn how to read and write for the first time but there was a big difference between him and the others in the class you see he was 18 years old now this and other stories entrusted to me changed me and by discovering these new worlds new worlds were opening up inside of me and gradually I started to realize that one single experience one single encounter can add more value to your life and a lifetime spent collecting stuff so I decided that instead of pursuing the stuff that fear was telling me I needed to collect to be a happy person I would pursue experiences instead and while I was at it I would get rid of a few of the things and stuff cluttering my life anyway solid recycle it give it away this was really scary at first but you see you have to let go of what you're holding on to to be able to take hold what lies on the other side if you can imagine a two-year-old holding his favorite toy and you wanting to give him a new toy a better one but he doesn't want to let go of the old toy because he doesn't understand that you're actually trying to give him something that's nicer that's better than the thing he's clutching a few years ago I walked 600 miles along the coast of Spain alone carrying only a backpack a little bit of water and every now and again I think back to that experience because to me that experience became a symbol of this process of letting go of the importance of lightening our load and then I asked myself that's in my backpack right now is there anything I can let go what is holding me back is there anything in your backpack today right now that you can let go it doesn't have to be stuff it can be a draining friendship or maybe some negative thoughts let it go because you see by holding on to what we think has worth we are depriving ourselves from the opportunity to pursue what is truly valuable experiences decision number to pursue friendships not likes so loneliness is a very real fear to the depressed mind but revealing who we truly are to someone else can be even scarier as it was for me and so it was only logical that social media would become a refuge a hiding place a stage on which I could retained that my life was perfect that everything is awesome however the one day I just felt so overwhelmed suddenly by all these suppose that friends I had on social media by the axis there had to my life and thoughts and the pressure of keeping up this facade I realized that online I was living this very like visible life but offline no one really knew what I was going through not to mention the fact that I was forever chasing all these likes and clicks you know the fear of loneliness it tells us that we you know we need those little stimuli I know that no one in this room understands what I mean when I say I enjoyed someone liking my photos is you're all fine but to me it became a problem and so I deactivated my accounts I decided I would pursue my friendships offline instead so was I afraid that now I wouldn't know what was happening in my friends lives yeah was I concerned that maybe some people would forget that I existed at all absolutely and some of them did but what also happened was that with my online self now deactivated my offline self became more present more honest more transparent to those around me I could just enjoy the moment I could just be in it I didn't have to think blue what filter would look nice in this picture or what status update can possibly describe the wonder of the scene I was just present in the moment and my friendships grew deeper more meaningful four years later my accounts are still deactivated decision number three pursue challenges not comforts I want you for a moment if you will to just draw an imaginary circle around yourself okay have you drawn a circle can you see it that circle represents your comfort zone the zone that we are humanly programmed to never leave because this is a safe zone but you know what I've discovered is that everything beautiful and meaningful in life happens the moment you step out of that circle but how do we step out how do we leave our comfort zone you see that circle keeping you fenced in it's not a barbed wire it's not an electric fence it's all in your mind that's what gives it power and that's what takes its power away I remember the first time I read the news live on television in South Africa I remember the glare of the lights or the cameras on me the adrenaline the voice in the earpiece counting me down 3 2 1 but mostly I remember thinking wow what a significant moment in my life what was the big deal the big deal was that as a child and into my early 20s I couldn't speak without stuttering stringing a sentence together would take me ages speaking was awkward awful embarrassing people will laugh Eve me behind my back so based on this I developed a fear of speaking be it on the phone publicly face to face so now if you if you look at this fear my pursuit should have been silenced my pursuit should have been the back row and my comfort zone everything but a stage like this but instead of pursuing but instead of pursuing silence I decided to pursue the challenge of having my voice heard so I stepped out of the circle I want to end with a final story a few years ago I traveled as a journalist to the Dadaab refugee camp in northeastern Kenya it is supposedly the biggest refugee camp in the world more than 500,000 people call it their home but it's also one of the harshest places on the planet it is incredibly hot there's very little green to distract from the desert and the shrubs to me it resembled an open-air prison the dub is where I met 17 year old Muhammad Muhammad was unlike any teenager I'd ever met in my life for starters he was a refugee he was born a refugee for 17 years in other words he'd never known a life outside of this camp think about it he'd never seen a paved road a city trees mountains a beach but Muhammad had a dream Muhammad said to me that he was going to be a doctor one day there was history he wanted to change the world he wanted to make it a better place and as I said they listening to the yearnings of his heart something quickened inside of me if Muhammad could imagine a life beyond this prison then what excuse do I have not to pursue my dreams not to face my fears what excuse do you have so as doing something scary every day cured me of depression no I still fear depressive episodes and the anxiety that suddenly comes out of nowhere but what scares me more is not living a meaningful life is not pursuing what lies beyond these fears that keep me up at night sometimes there is a quote by Williams shed that my mother once wrote in a birthday card to me it goes a ship is safe in Harbor but that's not what ships are for and that's my challenge to you today why don't you push your shipper discover what lies your what lies beyond your distant horizons pursue experiences not things pursue friendships not likes pursued challenges not comforts the last thing I wanted to do while I was lying in hospital and Katmandu was to go back to the mountains but what scared me more was what would happen if I allowed the accident to break not just my body but also my spirit so I got out of bed packed my bag put on my boots and back to the mountains I went why not do something today that scares you thank you

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 120,217

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, United Kingdom, Life, Achievement, Adventure, Africa, Depression, Happiness, Journalism, Mental health, Social Media

Id: pVIW0tDKtIo

Length: 17min 0sec (1020 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 11 2016